Monday, August 31, 2015

The Val Johnson CE2 case of 1979

I was recently interviewed at length by a reporter about the Val Johnson CE2 case from 1979, which had occurred near Stephen, Minnesota. The reporter asked me to provide copies of our case investigation plus photos taken at the time.

He didn't use any of it, and the piece which appeared in print teases the reader about what transpired back then. http://www.mprnews.org/story/2015/08/26/minnesota-deputy-squad-car-ufo-mysteryI maintain it's a very good case because of its detail and associated materials. The witness was a police officer. he suffered physiological effects. His police car suffered physical effects. The incident was investigated as an "accident" within minutes of it occurring. The witness and investigating officers all cooperated with both official and civilian investigators. There are many pages of documentation about the incident available, including official police reports. And the damaged police car is still available to view, at a museum as a unique artefact.

Like I said, it's a good case.I wrote about it in my ufozine The Swamp Gas Journal, back in 1980. Since the electronic copy of the issue vanishes from the Internet from time to time, I will present it here for (hopeful) posterity.

Volume 1 The
SWAMP GAS JOURNAL ISSN 0707-7106

Number 7 April, 1980

Special Report:
Stephen, Minnesota; Not Proof, But ...

A main issue under
examination at the Manitoba Conference on Ufology on March 16, 1980, was the
Val Johnson UFO incident which occurred on August 27, 1979. The case received
wide publicity and has been noted in most ufozines (it was noted in SGJ #6), so it will not be repeated
again here. Briefly, it involved the apparent impact of a US police vehicle
with an unidentified flying object, near the town of Stephen, Minnesota, The
incident was supported by various physical evidence in the form of dents,
impact marks and broken glass.

Frankly,
it is one of the most puzzling incidents in the history of ufology. This strong
statement is partly because of the fact that the case involves a man who has
been described as "the perfect witness." Val Johnson is a Deputy
Sheriff in Marshall County, Minnesota, and is a trained observer as well as an
experienced police officer. The physical evidence suggests that something very
strange happened to him in the early morning on a lonely stretch of road near
the Red River. The time sequence of events is very firmly established by both
tape recorded and written logs of his actions that morning. The physical traces
were examined and measurements were made immediately after the encounter by
trained police investigators, and Johnson was taken to a hospital by ambulance
directly from the site.

At
MCU, the case was discussed and reviewed in detail by all participants, as presented
by guests Val Johnson, Everett Doolittle and Greg Winskowski. Doolittle was the
first individual to reach the site after Johnson radioed for help, and
Winskowski conducted the initial police investigation. Many
fascinating points were noted, as follows:

The Physiological Effects

When Val Johnson was found
by Everett Doolittle, he was slumped forward over the steering wheel and in
mild shock. A bruise later appeared on Johnson's forehead, presumably caused by
impact with the steering wheel. He was dazed, and said that "everything
was in slow motion." He had an intense pain ("excruciating") in
his eyes, and, having done some welding in his career, knew what welders' burn
was like, comparing his pain to this.

“It
was as if someone had hit me in the face with a 400 pound pillow,” he said of
the sensation of his head.
However, he stated repeatedly that the only pain he experienced was from his eyes.
This is extremely interesting in the light of dental examinations he had one
week previous and one week after his experience. At the first, he had an
extensive series of x-rays taken, in preparation for major dental work. His
bridgework, including the caps on his front teeth, was intact. At the second
examination, the dentist found that Johnson's bridgework was broken at the
gums. Yet, no swelling or pain was felt.

The Physical Evidence

When Everett Doolittle
arrived on the scene, Val Johnson's police car was front-end-first in the

left-hand ditch, with the
other end sticking out into the left-hand lane of the road. The "impact
point" was determined by the location of the broken glass of the headlight
on the road, 953 feet from where the car was found. From that point, "yaw
marks" (described as faint skid marks caused by putting a car out of gear
without applying the brakes) traveled in a straight line for 854 feet down the
road. These became dark skid marks from there to where the car stopped moving,
going in a straight line for most of the remaining length, turning abruptly at
the end toward the ditch.

The
right member of the left pair of headlights was broken. There was a round dent, approximately one inch in
diameter, directly over the master brake cylinder, on the hood. This dent appeared
as if a hammer had struck the hood at an angle between 45 and 75 degrees from
the horizontal. A photograph taken with a UV filter showed that there was a
deposit left on the flat bottom surface of the dent.

The
windshield of the car had an interesting pattern of breakage, in the shape of a
teardrop (point up). This was located on the driver's side. There were three
main impact points visible, though the lowest of the three was largest and most
complex. Testing of the glass by the Ford Motor Company suggested that there
were signs of both inward and outward motion of the windshield. They were
apparently unfamiliar with the breakage pattern. It is fairly obvious, though,
that even a small stone would have been driven through the windshield, even at
relatively low speed, so it is hard to interpret the shattering as an actual
impact. However, it was noted at the Conference that the analytical findings
bear some resemblance to those of a shock-wave-induced breakage.

The
roof light which was affected had its glass knocked out. The police radio
antenna on the center of the roof was bent about 5 inches up from the roof, at
about a 45 degree angle. The CB antenna on the trunk was bent near its tip, at
an angle near 90 degrees, 3 inches from the top.

An
interesting observation made by the police investigators was that all the
damage on the vehicle occurred in a straight path no wider than twelve inches
in diameter. Because of this "linear" formation, it was suggested
that an object had struck a glancing blow to the car, initially impacting the
headlight, rolling over the hood, up the window and over the roof. However, at
the Conference, it was realized that this scenario could not account for all
the damage in the form it was observed. An object hitting the car at the front
would not have the capability to redirect its force downward further up the
hood, graze the window and still have enough force to bend the antennas.

The
antennas are spring loaded, so anything bending them would have to have been
traveling extremely fast to create the shape they are now in. It was also
proposed that the antennas were bent by a strong deceleration, causing them to
whip forward. But the design of the antennas is such that they can withstand a
strong deceleration without acute bending. Any deceleration of sufficient strength
to bend them backwards as they moved forward might have killed the occupant.
Most curiously, the insects adhered to the antennas were not wiped off from the
impact, as might be expected.

The
battery of the car can no longer hold a charge. It has been proposed that the headlight
and roof light were imploded by a high-energy electrical source. Ball lightning
was suggested as a cause, but it could not have created the dent in the hood,
nor the impacts on the window, let alone the bending of the antennas. The
electric clock in the car was found to be missing 14 minutes. Strangely, Val
Johnson's mechanical wristwatch was also lacking 14 minutes. This is indeed
odd, because both were synchronized with the clocks in the police station
earlier in the night, and all time checks after that agreed, as late as 01:00,
only a short while before the incident.

Finally,
the CB radio in the car, although It was said not to have been In the best
working order before the incident,
was described as being "even worse" after it.

Allan
Hendry, of the Center for UFO Studies, sent a gauss-meter to the police investigator,
in order for them to test for changes in the car's magnetic pattern. These
results were, apparently, negative.

There
was evidence of dust particles in the shattered glass, and it was suggested
that this dust was the residue found in the round dent in the hood.

The Psychological Effects

When Val Johnson called
for help, his voice was described as being "weak," and like
"someone coming out of a
daze." He had been, apparently, unconscious for 39 minutes, from the time
he heard glass breaking and felt the light "hit" him, to the time he
woke up, opening one eye to see the red ENGINE light on his dashboard. During
that period, the car had traveled in a straight line for 953 feet, before
veering to the left over the left lane into the ditch. He does not remember
applying the brakes, yet the skid marks belie the fact that they were
definitely applied.

At
MCU, Johnson was asked what he thought had happened to him that morning. He said that he believed he "had seen
something (he) wasn't supposed to see." Questioned on this, he could only
speculate that he had stumbled upon somebody doing something that wasn't meant
to be observed, and that his powers of observation had been effectively
neutralized.

He
also was asked if the procedure of regressive hypnosis had ever been suggested
to him. He replied that the National
Enquirer had asked him to submit to a regression, and offered to pay him for
the exclusive rights of the results. He had rejected their offer. He was then
asked if he would agree to a hypnotic regression with a clinical hypnotist, for
research purposes, and not for publication. He said no, and added that he was
"not curious" about what had happened to him that morning.

Everett
Doolittle said after this that their file on the case is now closed, and that
their investigation is now
terminated, after reaching no conclusions. They stated that their investigation
was over, and that the matter is now in the hands of the ufologists. They will
not subject Johnson to either a polygraph or a regressive hypnosis, as they
feel it is not necessary for their investigation. All three were asked if the
Air Force, CIA or FBI had approached them, and they all answered to the negative.

Val
Johnson was asked if he had since experienced any other unusual incidents such
as

extremely vivid dreams,
MIB or psi phenomena. In response, he revealed a highly interesting thing; from
time to time, he said, he will find himself thinking three words, which somehow
stick in his mind. The words stay with him "like a McDonald's
commercial," and he can find no reason for thinking them. The three words
are: "I AM COMMITTED." He concluded by noting that if he ever saw
that light again, he'd stop the car and "yell for help!"

Discussion

This case was reviewed in
detail at the conference, and photographs of the car were examined closely. Addition evidence
was brought forth and theories were presented to try to account for all the
evidence. Guy Westcott, a NOAP investigator, stated that he had found a
"burn mark" in the field beside the road, while he was examining the
site. This mark, about 6-7 feet in diameter, had no vegetation on its surface
and bore some resemblance to a fertilizer burn. Val Johnson said that a representative
from the USDA (Agriculture Rep) expressed a personal interest in the case and
had taken infrared aerial photographs of the site. These showed that the
ditches on either side of the site had a "different" chlorophyll
absorption than the

surrounding fields.

After
much debate, it eventually was concluded by the MCU participants that the
incident was inconsistent with the theory of the car having been struck by an
object of some sort, including ball lightning. The idea of hits by multiple
objects was considered and found marginally tenable. However, there are 39
minutes to account for, a complex sequence of impacts by several objects and some
effects caused at a short distance that still need satisfactory explanations.
Actions by unknown individuals can be included in the list of possibilities. It
is easily demonstrable that something very unusual happened that morning.

At
the present time, there is no adequate explanation for the effects noted in the
case, based on the proposed theories. Many questions still remain unanswered,
and they may remain unanswered for some time to come.

The Stephen, Minnesota,
incident is listed in UFOROM files as "unknown."